2008: Real estate takes a major hit
The housing bubble was finally bursting in 2008 as the Great Recession became the new reality in Western North Carolina and throughout the nation.
2009: Ghost Town comes crashing down
Decades after it first opened in 1962, Ghost Town in the Sky still commands a wistful loyalty from thousands of people who remember it during its heyday and are eager to return.
2012: Table games come to Harrah’s
Harrah’s Cherokee Casino Resort, an economic powerhouse that employs 5 percent of the workforce in the seven western counties and provides hundreds of millions of dollars each year to the tribe’s government and citizens, first opened its doors in 1997.
2013: Southern Loop scrapped for good
For a road that has never existed, the infamous Southern Loop of Sylva sure has gotten a lot of ink over the past 20 years.
2014: Transition to for-profit health care
Area hospitals finally found some steady financial footing in 2014 after years of floundering, trying to keep their heads above water as providing health care to rural Appalachia became more challenging.
2016: Fire on the mountain
As you read this, I’ve just noted the passing of my third anniversary with this 20 year-old newspaper and as such, the retrospectives I was charged to write this week were all on events that took place long before my arrival — except for this one.
2017: Cherokee impeaches its chief
When Patrick Lambert won the 2015 race for principal chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, he saw the victory as a direct mandate from voters.
2018: WCU sees a year of change
This roller coaster of a year at Western Carolina University started before it started, when the school’s beloved chancellor David O. Belcher announced Nov. 27, 2017, that he’d be stepping down at the end of the year.
